The Simbul’s Gift

So, why did he want to go? Why did he hope his ancestors couldn't find Ferrin or, in finding Ferrin, proved that the dead spirit had nothing to do with Mimuay's vision or his own disturbed thinking? In the end, how much was his own curiosity about Aglarond's mighty, Red-Wizard-killing queen? How much was his own yearning to be the hero for his daughter as he had once been the hero for Wenne?

The zulkir had not resolved anything in his mind when a glow returned to Chazsinal's chair.

"Oh, my son," the dead necromancer moaned. "Oh, my son, it is a terrible thing that you've done."

"That I've done? To send you off in search of a haunt named Ferrin?"

"Your daughter, Lauzoril. You're teaching your daughter and you haven't set the mark on her heart!"

Before Lauzoril could extract anything further from his distraught father, light swirled around Gweltaz's linen and, with it, the pale and shrunken spirit of a man. The zulkir expected the spirit of a man his own age or older, cunning, wise, and cruel who'd sensed Mimuay's talent, then exploited it for his own purposes. What he got was an apprentice, no older than his daughter, who dropped to his insubstantial knees.

"Mercy, my lord, mercy, I beg you! I would never harm her or you."

"He lies," Gweltaz hissed. "He spies on us. He pursues your precious daughter, mighty zulkir, and fills her silly head with our secrets." He spoke a necromantic word and Ferrin's spirit writhed on the crypt floor.

"How did you find her?" Lauzoril demanded.

Locked in Gweltaz's torment, the spirit couldn't answer.

"Release him."

"He lies, Grandson. He has corrupted your innocent. What more do you need? Let me have him."

If Gweltaz had been a little less eager. If Gweltaz had not despised Mimuay as female and weak. If Gweltaz hadn't been known to lie more often than not himself. "Release him, Grandfather, or I'll do it for you."

Tiny flames sprouted from the zulkir's fingers: un-subtle reminders of the damage fire could do to linen bandages. Gweltaz retreated. Lauzoril repeated his question to Ferrin.

"My lord, in the spring, Mimuay found my bones, my skull, and called me back—"

"Lies!" Gweltaz shouted. "We scour the bones Thazalhar heaves up each spring. He is from outside, Lauzoril. He is from Szass Tam! And you teaching her wizardry, Lauzoril? And she will teach your secrets to Szass Tam!"

The necromancer surged forward, enveloping Ferrin's far weaker spirit. Again, Lauzoril called on fire to separate them.

"She has a gift, my lord," Ferrin said. "She called me, but she could call others." By which Ferrin clearly meant the likes of Gweltaz and Chazsinal. "I told her to go to you. That is all I did."

"Lies! Lies! The child is as foolish as her idiot mother."

Lauzoril considered his grandfather, the spirit Mimuay had called out of an ancient grave and the talent still trapped in Wenne's clever, crippled mind. "How long have you been able to hear her, Grandfather?"

The zulkir got his answer, but not from the dead. The wards at the top of the crypt stairway rang like bells, then fell ominously silent.

Ferrin rose from the floor. "Send her away, my lord. You can, my lord. She is still innocent, my lord. Don't let her come down here!"

Ferrin saved himself with that plea, but Lauzoril wouldn't charm his daughter. He dissolved his wards instead before they did the job they were meant to do and destroyed her.

"Mindless fool!" Gweltaz roared just before Mimuay came through the crypt door.

In the moment of confusion, Gweltaz surrounded Ferrin, subsuming the apprentice's essence. Mimuay let out a scream that began as terror and ended as rage. Lauzoril grabbed her as she started for Gweltaz. His daughter called her friend's name and fought frantically with heels, elbows, and fingernails that raised bloody welts on her father's arms.

Then she stopped and became perfectly still. "He's gone. Ferrin's gone."

Lauzoril said a single word in Mulhorandi, the language of the Red Wizards' oldest, darkest magic. He held Mimuay tight, but did not cover her eyes, letting her witness the slow gathering of pinpoint sparks in the center of the crypt. The necromancers pleaded; Lauzoril would have saved Chazsinal— he'd done nothing to deserve the final death, but futility and waste had been the hallmarks of his father's existence; it was appropriate that they were present when the sparks expanded into an ember sphere that descended on the undead necromancers, consuming every part of them before extinguishing themselves.

"I regret Ferrin," Lauzoril said when he and Mimuay were together in the dark.

His hands were shaking as he pushed his daughter away and made light. Despite the shaking, he was strangely calm. Fifteen years ago, before he brought his father and grandfather to Thazalhar, Lauzoril had memorized the ancient spell that could destroy them. He'd kept it primed all these years. The emptiness in his mind, in the crypt, didn't seem quite real.

"Who were they?" Mimuay asked, calm and dry-eyed.